It looks like all the trees, whose leaves where going to turn colors and drop off, have finally gone bare. At least for the most part. There are a few trees with brown withered leaves still hanging on, not many though. The trees and leaves show coming to an end should bring relief to local drivers, though they may not realized it, for I will no longer be a road hazard.
Yes, I was a road hazard, distracted, while the leaves were changing colors. This was not so much because I was ogling their beauty and the beauty of the colors, though some were stunning colors. As a whole Autumn colors are not my favorite. Some individual colors that occur in Autumn are pretty. But I digress.
The real reason I was a road hazard is because I was fascinated looking at the trees and how the leaves had changed or dropped off or both. It has been a long time since I lived anywhere that the leaves changed in enough quantity to be noticeable. This year is different. This year I am someplace where the leaves change and drop from all but the pines and evergreen varieties, and maybe a few bushes. At least from what I can tell. The variety of colors has been quite amazing, from vivid pale yellow to deep fire brick red and so many in between.
Just as fascinating as the colors has been the structure of how the leaves changed. They did not all change at once. No, they changed from the top and outside and worked inwards. I realized that the outer leaves protected the inner leaves from the cold as well as the inner leaves likely being warmer and possibly hardier due to being closer to the trunk. So as the temperatures would drop, the most exposed leaves were the first to change and as they were less protection more leaves would change. In some cases it depended on how cold it had gotten and for how long. The colder and the longer it lasted the more leaves were effected.
Artistically this is all very interesting and important. To render an Autumn scene accurately I need to take this into consideration. If I want to depict something as early Autumn I want to make sure not to go overboard with the oranges and rusts and reds. The farther into Autumn the more of those colors I want to use. And the closer to Winter the more the branches will be bare.
Yes, this all makes sense. People who have lived in an area that the leaves change and drop are probably intuitively aware of this. All the more reason to get it right in art.
And you would think I would have caught on to this from the dramatic impact a single cold snap could have on the foliage in Central Florida. However devastating the impact was very rarely did it result in such a display. There would be a cold snap, leaves would be damaged, within a couple of days things would be warm again and all those damaged leaves would already be dried out and brown and falling off or ready to be trimmed off. This did not really serve to study how nature notes the change in temperatures on a continual and gradual basis.
Now, with this particular show from Mother Nature nearly over the roads a slightly more safe, at least from me. Then again, with the leaves gone, I am often surprised by the businesses and building that have revealed.